Now waait a minuite.There are some exaggeration here.I see some influence of “SHOGUN”and”Memoire of a Geisha”all over in this post.
I don’t see any indication between NINTENDO and sex between Samurai and boy,or is it just me.

Indeed, as David pointed out, and I would agree, the “mizu-shobai” is too much integrated in the daily life of Japanese urban couples/families. I would call it a structural problem which can’t be erased as Japan has a long history of entertainment, high and low. The culture, on which Japan is proud of and officially “exports”, is based on this “entertainment” which is full of decadence (like sex between samurai and boy, “mizu-age” with 10 years old girls) and pseudo romantic love.

Now I see problem here,Mulboyne.
Remember “Shitsurakuen” was written by the guru of 50 something salarymen in grey suits,Watanabe Jyunichi,who managed the entire novel written dominantly from male perspective. If only you are more keen viewer of 2o’clock soap operas you would find plenty of dramas of female narratives that give you some different ideas.

A woman in Britain who starts a relationship with a married man may well hope that the man will divorce his wife and then marry her. That doesn’t seem to be the general expectation of a Japanese woman whether she works in mizu shobai or not. The two adulterous lovers in the wildly popular “Shitsurakuen” didn’t see divorce and remarriage as a solution to their situation.

A divorced man in Japan often loses contact with children from his marriage. Partly this may be because there are no real laws to enforce visitation. It might be that a Japanese father doesn’t much want to maintain contact but I’ve also heard from Western friends who have remarried with a Japanese girl that their new wife often seems bemused that they would want to maintain a relationship with the children from a first marriage and sometimes actively resents it.

There’s a high risk of drawing false sweeping conclusions from such a small body of anecdotal evidence but I wonder whether a Japanese marriage places less emphasis on sex being exclusive and more on the family being exclusive compared with a western marriage.

Ironically, employment equality threatens that culture. More female managers means less blatant conducting of business in these quarters, which speaks to the idea that this system could only be created because of the overwhelming balance of economic and social power men maintain. British and French men can have affairs, but is there a multi-billion dollar industry based around the idea of women as rentable sexual property? Sure, Christian morality may get in the way, but when you systematically force women out of the possibilities of equal career opportunity, you can easily put them to work in your preferred nightlife style.

Same with mistresses, if marriage is required because of economic pressures, those whose choices are limited to low-earners or otherwise less desirable candidates, it may best to hitch to a successful man.

There is plenty of evidence that the culture of sex in Japan depends upon political and economic opportunity for women. We don’t just need this interview to come to those conclusions.

etc

we’re in the old problem territory on neomarxisme here as someone already hinted: there’s far too much projection here of commentators own cultural backgrounds and ideas of marriage (with marxy at the top) and it’s basically that that ends up being discussed. the fact that the japanese idea of marriage itself from meiji on has, formally and superficially speaking, a lot to do with rigid, dated western concepts only makes things more messy – particularly if they end up seen as ‘confucian’ or whatever.

the author does a good job in trying to keep a healthier view in the interview, but then by targeting such a book to anglo pseudo-japanologists she evidently took the responsability and risk of misunderstanding in the first place.